


unmade

by erytheia



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Flowers, Gen, Handholding, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Timeskip, Recovery, Stargazing, vague azure moon spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-06
Updated: 2020-01-06
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:21:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22138486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/erytheia/pseuds/erytheia
Summary: “I have never asked you anything, before.”“I never wanted that.” Dimitri spits, and there’s a flash of him, there, of that man Dedue used to know, the one that he still sees between the cracks in Dimitri’s tired old defences.“I know,” He tries, fails, to meet Dimitri’s eyes in the shallow moonlight, “but I am asking you now.”
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd & Dedue Molinaro
Comments: 4
Kudos: 72





	unmade

**Author's Note:**

> title: unmade - thom yorke

Dedue watches his king from across the church, beneath the eyes of the saints.

Night fell hours ago, but sleep has yet to find Dedue anywhere other than at his charge’s side, though in shadows. Dimitri is stood by the once-sanctuary, surrounded by rubble and ash, staring at the pieces. The moonlight is cold, leaving him all lit up, all exposed.

Dedue has seen how ruthlessly sleep evades Dimitri and has endlessly tried to offer his own in turn - has found him here when he fails, a spectre of black and blue. There’s a futility to the motion, one that Dedue knows Dimitri feels too, hears too, from the phantom figures of his loved ones. It does not stop Dedue from trying, or Dimitri from suffering, but the haunting of his past is not an enemy Dedue can defend him against. He can only watch the cloud of Dimitri’s ideals thicken and twist and _mutate_ , as though to blind him. The thought of losing him not in battle but to himself is a wound that stings, raw and constant.

Dedue alone cannot offer his king sleep, or redemption, or revenge, but he still crosses the monastery until he is stood with Dimitri under that unforgiving moon. Instead, he hopes to offer him something resembling peace, however fleeting.

He stops a few feet short of Dimitri, back straight and hands clasped behind it. They do not tremble, but Dedue sometimes wishes they would.

“Your Highness.”

A pause.

“What.”

Another.

Dedue has never rehearsed the self he presents to Dimitri, knowing the falsehoods his title invites day by day, but it’s something strange to be stood speechless before, behind, his king, and yet to fear nothing. He begins his quest for peace with something closer to predictability, if only to ease the nerves Dimitri tries to hide.

“You have not slept.”

“Is that a question?” Dimitri snarls, and Dedue stays still, soaking in his outbursts of hostility, locking them away inside himself.

“An observation.” Dimitri turns to face him, and Dedue believes he could almost smile. “It is late.”

“Another observation?” He sounds weary now, the smile fades.

Dedue nods, lets Dimitri settle into a momentary silence until he is ready to take that burden from him too, and he speaks. 

“I would like you…to come with me.” He can see Dimitri freeze just as he could feel his own heart break, if he allowed it to. He does not, will not, so instead eases them back into motion. “Only for a little while.”

The instant rejection is as ingrained as it is willed, and Dedue accepts both, lets Dimitri stare at him, through him, with that big blue eye.

“Don’t be ridiculous, you-” He lapses back into silence – he’s lost, not for the first time, but certainly the most openly.

Dedue waits.

“Why do you ask this of me?” Dimitri demands, but doesn’t try, anymore, to hide the vicious desperation behind it.

“I have never asked you anything, before.”

“I never wanted that.” Dimitri spits, and there’s a flash of him, there, of that man Dedue used to know, the one that he still sees between the cracks in Dimitri’s tired old defences.

“I know,” He tries, fails, to meet Dimitri’s eyes in the shallow moonlight, “but I am asking you now.” He’s speaking gently, oh so gently, treating Dimitri how he always wanted to be treated. Like a friend, now, when he needs it most and wants it least. There’s a sick humour in it, somewhere, if Dedue cared to acknowledge it.

“Come with me, Your Highness.” It’s a plea and an offer both, and he doesn’t care how Dimitri takes it so long as he _takes_ it. There’s a moment’s pause, a hesitation that Dedue clings to, holds close.

“Please, Dimitri.”

He meets his eyes now, and Dedue never thought watching Dimitri crumble would fill him with so much hope.

-

Dimitri had relented, and Dedue had guided him from that echoing hall.

The monastery is empty at this hour, and their footsteps fill the space they cross, reaching high up into the ceiling beams. The candlelight is sparse and flickering, and Dimitri wades through the darkness it throws with all the ease of a man who has spent too long drowning in it. Dedue tries to keep his head forward, confident, but cannot deny himself small glances back at his highness, as though he’s liable to vanish, to be lost, swallowed up by those tricky shadows.

Dedue leads them free of any watching eyes, through the gates and out onto the sprawling fields surrounding the monastery. Still, Dimitri follows.

There’s a small hill ahead, and Dedue does not stop until they are atop it, amongst a throne of flowers that he knows Dimitri does not see. He can feel his tension in the air between them, a taught wire that trembles and lashes at Dedue’s fragile offering of peace. Dedue takes a deep inhale of the night air, of the chill and of the flowers, and listens as Dimitri subconsciously mimics him, filling his own lungs.

The excuses are ones Dedue expected, had heard in the space between them ever since they breached the monastery walls, but Dimitri voices them, nonetheless. “I- we should not be here. What if something happens at the monastery, the empire could…” Dedue sits in the long grass, and Dimitri lapses into silence. Dedue can sense his discomfort, his excessive awareness of himself, even without laying eyes upon him. He wonders when Dimitri last let himself simply _be_.

“Nothing will happen. Not night.” He stares across the fields, at the grass, and it’s silver and swaying in the moonlight. “You cannot spend every moment waiting for disaster to befall us.”

“It will befall us though, will it not? It always does.” There’s something darker, gravelly, returning to his voice, and Dedue wishes to free him of it, here, in the flower bed.

“Maybe. But for now, we are still here.”

Dimitri is wary, says as much, “do you really think it is that simple?”

“No.” He answers, and watches Dimitri’s hackles lower again from the corner of his eye. They seem to sag, almost, under the weight of the world he carries on his shoulders. “But it can be, for tonight.”

Dedue turns back to the fields, to his peace, and waits. He waits for the shuffling of defeat, and then Dimitri is settling beside him in the soft grass. Dedue wonders when he will see the reality of it, as a victory.

They sit in the silence, for a while, listening to the wind twirling through the leaves, through petals, up into the sky and through the dirty blonde of Dimitri’s hair. It’s a caress, of some sorts, and Dedue wishes for Dimitri to feel it as such, soft against his human skin. It’s too easy to reminisce, alone in the flowers, and Dedue thinks faintly of his past as Dimitri no doubt thinks of his, too, and pale fingers start ripping up the grass.

“I hear them, always,” he says, and Dedue nods, listens to him exhale, “everyone I have lost.”

“Do you hear them now?”

“No.” Dimitri frowns, considers, shakes himself free of his sudden hesitation. “But they will come back.” Dedue laments his certainty, but Dimitri never hears, and continues. “They scream as they did on that day, on the days since. You all ask me to ignore them, to find peace, or something like it. But how could I dare to sleep when they find no rest, stuck in that torment whilst those that put them there live on?”

“That torment is as much your own as it is theirs.” Dedue offers, and Dimitri shows teeth.

“I am not selfish enough to claim it as mine when I did not suffer alone. You stand in the shadows just as I do, where is your peace?” His voice raises with every word, and Dedue keeps his calm with eyes full of flowers.

“I have yet to find it, but I have not given up.” Dimitri is facing him now, is rearing back in a challenge that Dedue does not allow him to voice. “I do not wish you to forget them.” He allows himself a pause and a frown, a moment to piece together his thoughts once he is certain of Dimitri’s silence. “But you should not let them control you. Your desire for revenge is something you share, but they are dead. You, are not.” Dimitri flinches, at that, loosens more grass. “You must allow yourself some of the peace you wish for them.”

It seems so simple, really, once said aloud, but Dimitri’s fists merely clench tighter. “Peace,” he echoes, “am I really deserving of that.” His voice is hoarse, shallow, and Dedue answers it as the question he knows it was not.

“Whatever I could say would not matter, as long as you’re unwilling to believe it.”

Dimitri stares at him for a moment longer, and then, too, turns to the fields. The wind is back again, gentler this time, and it’s almost peaceful until it skims the flowers, brings the fragrance to his nose.

“I heard you, too.” Dimitri whispers, and his hands rip the grass more violently. “When I thought you were dead, another life that I could not save.”

“I do not need you to save me.” Dedue says, and feels a brief moment of trepidation, at words often thought but never before said aloud. He had feared Dimitri’s response, he supposes, from the part of him that wants to save but never be saved. He never had the heart to tell him that to save can be to take, to lessen, and Dedue has already lost far too much. Dedue sits there in his fears and in flowers, and feels his breath catch deep in his chest as Dimitri _listens_.

He offers no objection, no offence, just turns to Dedue under the night sky. Dedue returns his gaze, and Dimitri looks vulnerable and open and _wanting_ for something, for the first time in an age.

“Lie down, Your Highness.” The words sprout from between his lips before he can fully consider them, but Dedue doesn’t think he would take them back for anything in the world.

Dimitri’s brow furrows, “what-”

In his sudden passion, Dedue mistakes his confusion for hesitation, “I will go first.” He has never been anything if not true to his word, so Dedue lies back against the grass at once, basking under the light with Dimitri sat above him. Dimitri stares down at him, the moon his halo, and Dedue let’s himself pretend for a moment that this is all there is to peace.

Dimitri is hesitant, wary, even, but he acquiesces. He lowers himself – slowly, roughly – onto his back, until there’s barely an inch between them, but so many miles above. Dedue hums, a low grumble deep in his chest, as they look up at the stars.

There’s so many, and Dedue watches them sparkle and spin and shine against the thick black reflected in his eyes. He finds a semblance of calm in the knowledge that Dimitri is looking too, that he’s seeing the same stars and the same sky, spread out above them, shielding them from the gods. Here it is just the two of them, alone with the constellations and the night wind as the sleeping world turns on around them, without them.

Dimitri huffs, but it’s soft. “Stargazing?” And there’s laughter in his voice like from all those years ago; the older, truer version of himself, back with Dedue even if just for this one moment in time. Dedue simply breathes as Dimitri gradually settles next to him, and listens as his breath slips free from that constant state of near panic into something smooth, like the summer breeze.

It’s easy to forget the past, lay like this, with Dimitri by his side and night-chilled air in his lungs. The flowers spread around them once stretched as far as the eye could see, but now Dedue can feel the soft cushion of them beneath him, tickling his fingers, palms, the nape of his neck. Though easy to forget, Dedue finds his past easier to face, now, lay on his bed of flowers rather than drowning in the sea of them around him. Now more than ever, he is reminded how he never wants to forget it.

Lost in his musings, Dedue takes some time before his eyes open again to the stars and he’s senses Dimitri going stiff beside him. Dedue is moments from turning to him, from one light to another, when Dimitri reaches for him, taking one of Dedue’s hands. He clutches it in both of his own and places it, firmly, against his chest, over his heart. He’s grip is verging on too tight, but all Dedue can feel is the warmth.

That is how they remain, for lazy seconds come minutes under the heavy night sky. Dedue can see Dimitri’s eye lid occasionally dipping from the corner of his own, and finally allows that small smile to spread across his lips.

“They’re beautiful.” Dimitri murmurs after a while, voice thick and slow with sleep. “The stars.”

Dedue tilts his head towards him, and that steadily drooping eye looks back, at last still and calm and at peace.

“Allow yourself this.” Dedue says, as Dimitri listens. “Allow it for me, too.”

Dimitri continues staring back until he doesn’t need to, anymore, and then the hands holding his own squeeze tighter, and his eyes slips shut.

“For you, then.”

**Author's Note:**

> I am so in love with them 
> 
> thank you so much for reading!♡  
> [twt](https://twitter.com/lostchuu/)


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